Recently, two of my three UOB cards were due for the annual fees. The UOB Preferred Platinum Visa (PPV) and UOB PRVI Miles Card have annual fees of S$192 and S$256 respectively, and both do not award you any miles for the payment of annual fees.
I only make payment of annual fees for cards that give me something in return, such as miles. For example, both Citi Premiermiles and DBS Altitude cards offer 10000 miles for the payment of annual fees. Hence, I would be inclined to request for an annual fee waiver for the UOB PPV and UOB PRVI Miles cards.
Upon close inspection of my credit card statement, I realised that UOB automatically deducted UNI$4800 (or 9600 miles) and UNI$6000 (or 12000 miles) for my UOB PPV and UOB PRVI Miles card annual fees respectively. It is clear that UOB values miles at about 2 cents each, given the corresponding UNI$ deductions.
Obviously I was flustered, and made an immediate call to UOB, stating that I was willing to pay my annual fees in full, just so that I could keep my miles. Of course, being a loyal UOB customer, the customer service officer was very kind to waive all my annual fees, and refund me my UNI$ (miles) in full.
I would strongly recommend those who do not scrutinise your credit card statements to do so, in order to avoid losing your miles unnecessarily. Plus, it wouldn’t hurt to give them a call to waive your annual fees if you can afford the time.